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J.C. Beaglehole
John Cawte Beaglehole OM CMG (13 June 1901 - 10 October 1971) was a New Zealand poet and academic, whose greatest scholastic achievement was the editing of James Cook’s 3 journals of exploration together with the writing of an acclaimed biography of Cook. Life Youth and education Beaglehole was born and grew up in Wellington, New Zealand, the 2nd of 4 sons of David Ernest Beaglehole, a clerk, and his wife, Jane (Butler). His elder brother was Ernest Beaglehole, who became a psychologist and ethnologist. John was educated at Mount Cook School and Wellington College before being enrolled at Victoria University College, Wellington of the University of New Zealand, which later became an independent university, and where he subsequently spent most of his academic career. After his graduation, he was awarded a scholarship to study at the London School of Economics, and left for England in 1926. After 3 years of post-graduate study earned a Ph.D. with a thesis on British colonial history. Early career At this time Beaglehole was much influenced by left-wing teachers, especially R.H. Tawney and Harold Laski, and on returning to New Zealand he found it difficult to obtain an academic post owing to his radical views. For a time he had various jobs including a spell as a Workers Educational Association lecturer, and had time to develop other enthusiasms including civil rights issues, writing poetry, and music, an interest inherited from his mother. In 1932 he took a temporary position as a lecturer in history at Auckland University College, but within months the position was abolished in a retrenchment by the college council. Many believed the decision was due more to the college's reaction to Beaglehole's reputation (albeit exaggerated) for radicalism. His academic career finally took off in 1934 after the publication of his first major book, The Exploration of the Pacific, after which he developed his specialist interest in James Cook. He became lecturer, later professor, at the Victoria University College. He married Elsie Mary Holmes in 1930, and they had 3 sons. Editing Cook’s journals Beaglehole became known internationally for his work on Cook’s journals which brought out his great gifts as historian and editor. It was not all desk work among the archives – he also travelled widely in Cook’s wake, from Whitby to Tahiti, to Tonga and to the New Hebrides. The 4 volumes of the journals that emerged between 1955 and 1967 were subsidized by the New Zealand government, which also set up a special research post for their author. The sheer size of these tomes, each of them approaching 1,000 pages, may seem disconcerting initially, but they are enlivened by Beaglehole’s stylish and often witty introductions, intended to set the journals in their contexts. As well as Cook’s own journals Beaglehole also printed, either entire or in lengthy extracts, the journals of several of Cook’s colleagues on the voyages. The introductions themselves, together with copious footnotes, reveal the breadth of his erudition. They cover many topics, ranging from the structure of Polynesian society to oceanography, navigation, cartography, and much else. Cook’s journals themselves had never before been comprehensively and accurately presented to the public, and to do so required enormous research since copies and fragments of the journals and related material were scattered in various archives in London, Australia and New Zealand. For his edition, Beaglehole sought out the various surviving holographs in Cook’s own hand in preference to copies by his clerks on board ship, and others. For the 1st voyage, the voyage of the Endeavour, he used mainly the manuscript journalCook, James, 1728-1779. Journal of the H.M.S. Endeavour, 1768-1771 manuscript. held in the National Library of Australia at Canberra. This only came to light in 1923, when the heirs of a Teesside ironmaster, Henry Bolckow, put it up for sale. Bolckow had purchased this manuscript at an earlier auction, in 1868, but had not made his ownership widely known, and consequently it was assumed for many years that no such holograph existed. For the 2nd voyage Beaglehole used two other partial journals in Cook’s hand, both of which had the same early history as the Endeavour journal. All 3 had probably once been owned by Cook’s widow, and sold by a relation of hers at the 1868 auction. The difference was that the 2 partial journals from the 2nd voyage were then purchased by the British Museum and not by Bolckow, and hence had long been available for public consultation. For the 3rd voyage Beaglehole’s main source was a journal written, and much revised, by Cook up to early January 1779, a month before he died. What happened to the final month’s entries, which must certainly have been made, is uncertain.Glyn Williams:The Death of Captain Cook, Profile Books, 2008 This, too, is today in the British Library, the successor to the British Museum as a manuscript repository. All students of Cook owe an enormous debt to Beaglehole for his all-encompassing editorship. So much so, in fact, that today it is difficult to view the subject of Cook except through Beaglehole’s perspective. Some recent biographies of Cook have tended to be little else than abbreviated versions of Beaglehole.For a discussion of some recent books on Cook see Glyndwr Williams, ‘Reassessing Cook’ in Captain Cook: Explorations and Reassessments, ed. G. Williams, London, The Boydell Press, 2004 Nevertheless, it is also clear that Beaglehole’s work is, by and large, a continuation of the long tradition of Cook idealization, a tradition from which post-Beaglehole scholarship has started to diverge.Nicholas Thomas: page xxxvi. Discoveries: The Voyages of Captain Cook, London, Allen Lane, 2003 For Beaglehole, Cook was a heroic figure who could do practically no wrong, and he is scathing about those contemporaries of Cook who ever ventured to criticise his hero, such as Alexander Dalrymple, the geographer, and Johann Reinhold Forster, who accompanied Cook on the 2nd voyage. Recent research has to some extent rehabilitated both Dalrymple and Forster.For the rehabilitation see Andrew Cook’s introduction to the reissue of Dalrymple’s An Account of the Discoveries made in the South Pacific Ocean, Sydney, 1996; also, Michael E. Hoare (ed.), The Tactless Philosopher: Johann Reinhold Forster 1729-98, Wellington NZ, 1979 Just before he died in 1971 Beaglehole was in process of revising his detailed and authoritative biography of Cook, which was subsequently prepared for publication by his son Tim (currently Chancellor and Emeritus Professor at VictoriaChancellor). Recognition During his last decade Beaglehole was showered with honorary degrees from universities at home and abroad and other distinctions. Perhaps the most prestigious was the award in 1970 of the British Order of Merit. He was only the 2nd New Zealander ever to receive this award (the 1st being nuclear physicist Ernest Rutherford). Beaglehole had a lifelong association with Victoria University College (which became Victoria University of Wellington), and after his death the university named its archival collections after him. The archive's reading room displays his portrait, by W.A. Sutton. The J.C. Beaglehole Room, as it is known, was moved into a completely new space in 2011. Beaglehole Glacier in Graham Land, Antarctica, is named after him. Publications Poetry *''Words for Music''. Christchurch, NZ: Caxton, 1938. Non-fiction *''Captain Hobson and the New Zealand Company; A study in colonial administration''. Northampton, MA: Smith College, 1928. *''The Discovery of New Zealand''. London: Allen & Unwin, 1936. *''The University of New Zealand: An historical study''. Wellington: New Zealand Council for educational research, 1937. *''New Zealand: A short history''. London: Allen & Unwin, 1938. *''New Zealand in the Commonwealth: An attempt at objectivity''. Wellington: New Zealand Institute of International Affairs, 1938 *''New Zealand and the Statute of Westminster: Five lectures''. Wellington: Victoria University College, 1944. *''Victoria University College: An essay towards a history''. Wellington: University of New Zealand, 1949. *''The Exploration of the Pacific''. London: A. & C. Black, 1966; Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1966. *''Captain Cook and Captain Bligh''. Wellington: Victoria University of Wellington, 1967. *''The Life of Captain James Cook. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1974. *The Death of Captain Cook. Wellington: Alexander Turnbull Library, 1979. Edited *''The Endeavour Journal of Joseph Banks 1768-1771. Sydney: Angus & Robertson. **''Volume I, 1962 **Volume II, 1963. *''The Journals of Captain James Cook: The Voyage of the Endeavour,1768-1771, Cambridge: Hakluyt Society / University of Cambridge Press, 1955, reprinted 1968. The Journals of Captain James Cook: The Voyage of the Resolution and Adventure, 1772-1775. Cambridge, UK: Hakluyt Society / University of Cambridge Press, 1961, reprinted 1969. *''The Journals of Captain James Cook: The Voyage of the Resolution and Discovery, 1776-1780''. (2 volumes), Cambridge: Hakluyt Society / University of Cambridge Press, 1967. Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.Search results = au:J.C. Beaglehole, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Apr. 12, 2014. See also *List of New Zealand poets References *Tim Beaglehole, ‘Beaglehole, John Cawte (1901-1971)’, The Captain Cook Encyclopaedia (edited by John Robson). London: Chatham Publishing, 2004. *E.H. McCormick, ‘Beaglehole, John Cawte (1901-1971)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004. Notes External links ;Poems *J.C. Beaglehole at Kowhai Gold ;Books *John Cawte Beaglehole at the NZ Electronic Text Centre, 12 August 1926 - 3 November 1927 ;Books *J.C. Beaglehole at Amazon.com ;About *J.C. Beaglehole in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography *"A Portrait of the Researcher as a Patient Man, The Pantograph Punch Category:1901 births Category:1971 deaths Category:Alumni of the London School of Economics Category:Companions of the Order of St Michael and St George Category:People educated at Wellington College (New Zealand) Category:Historians of the Pacific Category:New Zealand historians Category:Victoria University of Wellington alumni Category:Victoria University of Wellington faculty Category:20th-century poets Category:English-language poets Category:New Zealand academics Category:New Zealand poets Category:Poets